The NFL lags behind its major sports brethren in the world of blockbuster trades. First round picks do get swapped in the NFL, but it’s been rare to see two players of significance traded in the same deal.
One of the big reasons why is the concept of dead salary cap room. NFL contracts often have big bonuses and clauses that made it incredibly punitive to the team to trade away a big-ticket player, especially early in the contract.
The Rams broke the norm by dealing Jared Goff to the Lions for Matthew Stafford in a swap of starting quarterbacks, one that will be finalized on March 17th. Los Angeles included two future first-round picks and a third-round pick to help sweeten the pot for the Lions to take on Goff’s contract and ease the own poison pill on Stafford’s dead cap that Detroit will eat.
Now it seems the genie is out of the bottle. The Philadelphia Eagles are actively shopping Carson Wentz, per numerous sources. And they seem fine with swallowing a $33.8 dead salary cap hit for 2021, the biggest in NFL history and over double what the Lions are paying to not have Matthew Stafford playing QB in Detroit this year.
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Teams have never shown a willingness to make that kind of move before. What the Rams did in sending Goff to Detroit has opened the eyes of other teams stuck in bad QB contracts. As terrible as Wentz played in 2020, the demand for quarterbacks with his draft pedigree and relative level of career accomplishment outweighs the supply.
It’s clear the Lions-Rams trade is the catalyst. ESPN’s Adam Schefter acknowledged it on his podcast detailing the reports of the Wentz trade ideas.
“The Eagles are said to be looking for, in the words of one well-placed source, “a Matthew Stafford package” in return for Wentz,” Schefter said.
If the Houston Texans ever decide to acquiesce to Deshaun Watson’s burning desire to leave the team, they’ll also wind up eating some major dead money. The same is true of the rumors out there about the Raiders and Derek Carr or the 49ers and Jimmy Garoppolo. But the Lions proved willing to take on the huge contract – for a hefty sum of draft capital. The unusual move seems to be a catalyst for all kinds of QB carousel whimsy now.